Back in the dim and distant days of role-playing, when AD&D was only beginning to stir and things were still by and large left to the imaginations of individual players and DMs, the older Loremasters amongst you may recall that Miniature Figurines Ltd produced a range of 25mm fantasy figures under the title of VALLEY OF THE FOUR WINDS, designed by Dick Higgs and released in 1978. There was nothing generic or vanilla about these figures; a very unique and quite terrifying world was emerging from Mr Higgs’ fevered imagination, owing more to the works of Hieronymous Bosch and Pieter Bruegel than J.R.R. Tolkien or Robert E. Howard, but no story to back it – just a set of bizarre figures and your own imagination to fill in the blanks. (Which the much younger me promptly started to do.)

A story WAS duly forthcoming a short time later in 1979, published in the pages of the early issues of WHITE DWARF magazine – issues 8 -13 if I recall aright. The pen name ‘Rowland Flynn’ apparently disguised the writing of David Langford, aided and abetted by Ian Livingstone and Steve Jackson, the driving forces behind Games Workshop at that time. It was a diverting enough read, again with a flavour all its own. A year later a VALLEY OF THE FOUR WINDS board game designed by Lewis Pulsipher was released by Games Workshop. And there, it seems, the story ends. No further development was forthcoming, although the figures remain something of a cult hit and many of them can still be purchased from Minifigs to this day.

Where’s all this heading? Well, it’s that matter of ‘flavour’ again, and the flavour of VFW is distinctive and quite addictive, given enough time and pondering, and I believe a unique flavour makes for the best D&D. This world is pretty unique in my opinion and, I think, possibly worth exploring a little more.

I’ve therefore had the idea of running an OD&D campaign in the VALLEY OF THE FOUR WINDS setting. It will be based on the ideas inspired by the original figures and the subsequent story, but won’t be ruled by either. In the spirit of OD&D I have a few tweaks and add-ons of my own I’d like to incorporate.

So the call goes forth, bold adventurers. Who will join me in my journey across the Stonefinger Mountains?

Who will look upon the shining towers and elegant plazas of the good city of Farrondil?

Who will walk with me in the mist-drenched, witch-haunted depths of Greengorm Forest?

Who will dare the depthless, trackless hell of the Southern marshes, home to the alien, pitiless, unfathomable Swamp Lords?

And who, if any, will dare to pass beyond Black’s Bridge and walk the accursed Plain of Darkness, where it is said a mere footfall will unleash the doom of Men, and the tolling of a black bell will raise the countless withered bones of the restless dead to take a terrible revenge upon the living?

Sound like fun? I’m looking for approximately 4 – 6+ players to give this a go. Please post expressions of interest below and we’ll take it from there.

A chill wind blows from the East. The VALLEY OF THE FOUR WINDS awaits…

I'd be up for it if on Immersive Ink. But now that I'm down to games on just two forums, I'd rather not go back to three. Just makes it more difficult to keep up with where I need to post and what I need to follow.

I'm hoping to run it on ODD74, purely because I think the board we have here is very much for playing and testing DELVING DEEPER, and quite rightly so. What I'm trying with VALLEY OF THE FOUR WINDS is going to be perhaps a little more experimental and freeform ('Arnesonian' is the phrase I used to describe it to ways, I believe, ) and I don't want it to muddy the waters regarding the work everyone's doing over here, so, after mulling it over, I thought the OD&D boards would probably be the best place to try and run it.

I quite understand your wish to avoid the headaches of multiple boards, but if you're up for it, it would be fantastic to have you on board!

I don't want to presume too much, but I think there were more reasons for Immersive Ink than just the play testing of Delving Deeper.

I recall WOTE mentioning at the time of the move that the ODD74 forum was limiting in what you could do to modify forum features and functions, like adding buttons for dialog and the alignment languages and the IC and OC tags and, more recently, adding character stats to your signature and then only having them display when posting under that game ID.

I think these are all brilliant mods that increase playability and add to the structure of the game.

I don't at all think WOTE has any issues with other GMs starting up a game on the forum.

Honestly, aside from not wanting to go back to three forums to keep track up for gaming, I was happy to leave ODD74 because of the base functions of the forum, as well. It wasn't the most user-friendly forum design.

I see where you're coming from, and I completely agree this forum offers lots of functions the other does not. I will also hold up my hand and admit to not being the most computer-literate person in the world, so many of these may not register with me as much as they should. But I still very much appreciate the effort and hard work that clearly goes into these boards. They are a joy to navigate.

Let's see how things go. It may all be academic anyway if I don't get enough players. Many thanks for your feedback regardless.

It is true that one of the main motivations for establishing this forum was to have more flexibility and control of the forum functionality itself, in order to facilitate a better play by post experience. From that perspective, I believe migrating my own games to this site has been a success.

The other reason was probably a bit more esoteric, but I got a jolt when I read the Proboards terms of service and found that by posting content on Proboards you implicitly:

YOU HEREBY GRANT THE PROBOARDS PARTIES A PERPETUAL, FULLY PAID-UP, WORLDWIDE, SUBLICENSABLE, IRREVOCABLE, ASSIGNABLE LICENSE TO COPY, DISTRIBUTE, TRANSMIT, PUBLICLY DISPLAY OR PERFORM, EDIT, TRANSLATE, REFORMAT AND OTHERWISE USE USER CONTENT IN CONNECTION WITH THE OPERATION OF THE WEBSITE, SERVICES OR ANY OTHER SIMILAR OR RELATED BUSINESS, IN ANY MEDIUM NOW EXISTING OR LATER DEVISED, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION IN ADVERTISING AND PUBLICITY. YOU FURTHER AGREE THAT THE PROBOARDS PARTIES MAY PUBLISH OR OTHERWISE DISCLOSE YOUR PERSONAL INFORMATION IN CONNECTION WITH THEIR EXERCISE OF THE LICENSE GRANTED UNDER THIS SECTION. YOU AGREE TO WAIVE, AND HEREBY WAIVE, ANY CLAIMS ARISING FROM OR RELATING TO THE EXERCISE BY THE PROBOARDS PARTIES OF THE RIGHTS GRANTED UNDER THIS SECTION, INCLUDING WITHOUT LIMITATION ANY CLAIMS RELATING TO YOUR RIGHTS OF PERSONAL PRIVACY AND PUBLICITY. YOU WILL NOT BE COMPENSATED FOR ANY EXERCISE OF THE LICENSE GRANTED UNDER THIS SECTION.

Paranoid though it may seem, I simply wasn't comfortable to continue to abide by those terms once I had become aware of them.

As far as game rules go; yes I have been running various incarnations of the DD rules here, but remember also that my Hinterlands game has always been a test-bed for other house rules too. In fact I've been running Hinterlands since before I got involved with the DD project All of which is to say any rules are welcome here, although (naturally!) I do have an inclination toward OD&D-influenced rules myself.

waysoftheearth wrote:...The other reason was probably a bit more esoteric, but I got a jolt when I read the Proboards terms of service and found that by posting content on Proboards you implicitly:

Wow, that's... not cool. Basically sounds like it says they could take the experience of a game and box that up and sell it (or some such thing) should they chose to do so. Even more reason to not go back to ODD74. A serious lack of scruples in the RPG world goes back really far - all the way to the early days.